Well, the Literary Den did not make it onto the Channel 4 TV show, Battlefront. We came second in the public vote and in the judges' room, which I suppose is pretty damn good! The Campaign will continue as before, just without the handy Flip Camera and the associated videos (unless someone wants to make a donation....)
I've not got much else to say... I opted to enjoy my first Monday off since... well the last bank holiday, so I don't have that new file done yet. Maybe tomorrow. Definetely by the weekend.
So, until something new and exciting happens, I'll be off.
But feel free to follow me on Twitter!
I use it for my own life as well as the Den. People need to know the man behind the mask.... in this case, the author behind the Campaign!!
Monday, April 6, 2009
Saturday, April 4, 2009
20 million people in the UK don't read!
So, it's official - there are 20 million people in the UK who just don't read. They can afford to, they just have no interest to. An article by The Bookseller reveals all.
As a way to combat this, the Literary Den Campaign will take a number of actions. The first will be to create a Guide to Bookshops. Now, this isn't meant as an insult to anyone, merely as a response to the article. Apparently, the codes and references in bookshops are putting people off. So, the Guide will explain special offers, ISBN and genres to help customers find their way.When it's done, I ask that people spread it far and wide - the more people that know their way through a bookshop, the better.
Now, obviously every bookshop is laid out differently. But that doesn't mean that they use different terms. Everyone in the book world uses the acronym ISBN; everyone has "3 for 2" offers, and "25% off" and other such things. Pretty much all the High Street bookshops have the same genre sections. Any differences are easy enough that customers can find their way - we have to remember that everyone has a bit of common sense, and if they still get lost, there are always staff there to point them in right direction.
I see this every week. It's the advantage of being a writer and book campaigner who works in a bookshop! I'm there on every side of the transaction at some stage and therefore I know what I'm talking about. This document will help!
Thanks for tuning in..... well, no one really does as far as I know. But if you're that one person who does, thank you!
As a way to combat this, the Literary Den Campaign will take a number of actions. The first will be to create a Guide to Bookshops. Now, this isn't meant as an insult to anyone, merely as a response to the article. Apparently, the codes and references in bookshops are putting people off. So, the Guide will explain special offers, ISBN and genres to help customers find their way.When it's done, I ask that people spread it far and wide - the more people that know their way through a bookshop, the better.
Now, obviously every bookshop is laid out differently. But that doesn't mean that they use different terms. Everyone in the book world uses the acronym ISBN; everyone has "3 for 2" offers, and "25% off" and other such things. Pretty much all the High Street bookshops have the same genre sections. Any differences are easy enough that customers can find their way - we have to remember that everyone has a bit of common sense, and if they still get lost, there are always staff there to point them in right direction.
I see this every week. It's the advantage of being a writer and book campaigner who works in a bookshop! I'm there on every side of the transaction at some stage and therefore I know what I'm talking about. This document will help!
Thanks for tuning in..... well, no one really does as far as I know. But if you're that one person who does, thank you!
Friday, April 3, 2009
Campaign Update
Well, voting has stopped on the Campaign! In fact, we've even gone one step further to getting the Campaign into the show - I got a call from London on Wednesday. I liked that I got to confuse people with that piece of info for a little bit!
The call was terrifying to say the least. I was so afraid I'd mess it up there and then. Ultimately though, I may not get through. It could potentially cost too much to send a camera crew over to Dublin, when the other campaigns are all in the UK. Bummer....
Still, fingers crossed!
In other news, the How to Write Document has been updated. Basically, the date was in the wrong format, there was a typo in one of the questions (so it came up several times!) and one of the author's names wasn't underlined or centred. You can download the updated file here.
I'll find out on Monday if I've been accepted by Battlefront. Wish me luck!
I finished typing my story for The Literary Den Book of New Fiction 2009. Yay! And I have the same editor as last year - Claire Hack. So, we have ten submissions so far, and we're still waiting on a few. I'm so excited about this one. I think the book will be better, and there are already more writers from Ireland in it than last year! Yahoo! That'll make promoting it so much more fun too!! When it's released, I demand that you buy it. Afterall, the money goes to charity!
The call was terrifying to say the least. I was so afraid I'd mess it up there and then. Ultimately though, I may not get through. It could potentially cost too much to send a camera crew over to Dublin, when the other campaigns are all in the UK. Bummer....
Still, fingers crossed!
In other news, the How to Write Document has been updated. Basically, the date was in the wrong format, there was a typo in one of the questions (so it came up several times!) and one of the author's names wasn't underlined or centred. You can download the updated file here.
I'll find out on Monday if I've been accepted by Battlefront. Wish me luck!
I finished typing my story for The Literary Den Book of New Fiction 2009. Yay! And I have the same editor as last year - Claire Hack. So, we have ten submissions so far, and we're still waiting on a few. I'm so excited about this one. I think the book will be better, and there are already more writers from Ireland in it than last year! Yahoo! That'll make promoting it so much more fun too!! When it's released, I demand that you buy it. Afterall, the money goes to charity!
Sunday, March 29, 2009
How to Write, Document 1
Well, the first of the How to Write Documents is finished and available for free! If you click the title of this post, you'll be brought to the download page. I love it already!
The second set of interviews will go out in the near future. I must also remember to begin interviewing again, to ensure the continued survival of the project. Free information for writers! Woo!!
Wish me luck! The Campaign may suddenly get more interesting based on Channel 4's decision!! I'll keep you updated.
The second set of interviews will go out in the near future. I must also remember to begin interviewing again, to ensure the continued survival of the project. Free information for writers! Woo!!
Wish me luck! The Campaign may suddenly get more interesting based on Channel 4's decision!! I'll keep you updated.
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Campaigning...
Well, I've finally found what I can blog about! Campaigning!! The Literary Den is at last becoming a place to support writing fully. I started off the Campaign by announcing our goals in a nice little .pdf file! To access this file, click here!
I had written up those goals a couple of weeks ago, just as our Battlefront page appeared. Today, I typed them up on a jazzy template, and added them to my new 4shared.com page for the purpose of sharing them with everyone. It's a pretty easy way of doing things!
Now I'm getting ready to go hunting for the advice several writers gave me a few months ago!! Wish me luck, ficticious reader!
I had written up those goals a couple of weeks ago, just as our Battlefront page appeared. Today, I typed them up on a jazzy template, and added them to my new 4shared.com page for the purpose of sharing them with everyone. It's a pretty easy way of doing things!
Now I'm getting ready to go hunting for the advice several writers gave me a few months ago!! Wish me luck, ficticious reader!
Friday, March 27, 2009
It's been a while, etc...
Hello, valuable and non-existant readers!
I have been vanished for a good long while from this blog. I missed it a few minutes ago, and decided to give one massive update on it.... I've just checked my last post, and I discovered I used the term vanished then too.... righto!
Well, I completed NaNoWriMo. That was easy, and way back in November. I wrote a novel called Meet Sam, which I will get back to in a little while. I will tell you that it was super fun to write and came in at 50,074 words according to the NaNoWriMo drones. Following that, I was very lazy at writing, but managed to get Geneticide finished in January. Hurray for me! Since then, I've had Mocks (I did rather poorly in them), an oral Irish exam, and have had a huge number of writing related things happening. But let's do this properly - chronologically!
Meet Sam is a fantastic novel (for me) following a helplessly poor writer through one day of his otherwise dull life. He's single, and miserably so, and decides to invent a narrator for himself. Sam Richards is in fact a wee bit crazy. His narrator abuses him at every opportunity, but in the 24 hours that she exists, his life changes dramatically. The book is that story! As part of the deal for completing NaNoWriMo, I got to get a free proof copy of Meet Sam from a group of people called CreateSpace. They even covered the postage. That was nice of them. The book is a delightful addition to my collection, and has caught the attention of my mother's friends at work.
Geneticide finished with a much higher word count. I don't even know what it is, only that it's rather good. The story went exactly as planned, which I'm happy about. It took very long to write, but I think it'll do well if it ever goes anywhere.
In February, I turned 18. Normally, I don't celebrate my birthday with such excitedness, but this was the February midterm break too. This called for celebration. I threw a house party. It was a delightful gathering of my friends, during which there was a movie and a giant personality test. I'll expand on that now! The movie was in fact a home movie of sorts - Meet Sam, as done by my friends Karl, Andrew, Ciarán and Conor. They gave up a few afternoons to do it. Karl has since failed to upload it onto Youtube a dozen times, so I cannot share it with you. The personality test was the BBC one. It was rather fun, and had my friends bashing against each other in my kitchen. It was not built to hold 14 people in a tiny square.
Then came March, this month. I can tell you that things really changed this month. It's almost at an end too, so if there was nothing to report, there would be a problem. Now, I can't remember what happened first in all this, so I'll just ramble on about the various different things that have happened.
Let's start with dear old Patricia Scanlan! She did a book signing a couple of weeks ago to promote her new book Happily Ever After? at my shop. It was a great experience in itself to watch it and help out, btu then something really fun happened! She found out that I'm a writer, and told me to give her a call when my novel (Meet Sam) was editted, so that she could give it to her publishers! I was utterly gobsmacked!! Imagine me, a published author! With Transworld Ireland!!!
Then there's Battlefront. This is a Channel Four television show that encourages a whole set of campaigns from young people to help change the world. I submitted The Literary Den Campaign to them... and we're second in the voting stages. In a few days, voting stops and it goes to the "judges." If they pick my campaign, I may be on television!! That would be amazing!
The campaign is all about making reading and writing cool again. People seem to get bored with them ratehr easily these days. They abandon the thoughts of them for a TV show or a movie, or for mindless internet games. It's an awful shame, because they really are valuable skills for both work and life. Writing is a way of ridding oneself of the weird little ideas in their heads that can cause us troubles. I have not heard of any dangerous writers out there, so I must be right.
The campaign also sets out to start a mentoring system to help younger writers with their stuff. I'm one of the mentors, although we are without mentorees. I'm hoping to convince my good friend Sam to do it. He started writing a book way back in the summer and since stopped doing it. If I can spark his interest in writing again, and be his mentor to guide him along the way, then I'm doing something right. From there I'd like to see what the group can do. We may even be able to organise talks at schools! That would be sweet!
So, there's my campaign. Some of it, at least. If you wish to support us, you can vote at: http://battlefront.co.uk/campaign/the-literary-den-campaign Thanks a million in advance!!
Moving on now, I've subscribed to a magazine called The Stinging Fly. I've also submitted to them. By the end of the month, or in early April, I should hear from them to see how my submission of a short story and two poems went down. I imagine the story, called The Wounded Angel, stands a better chance than the poems, but who am I to judge? Fingers crossed anyway!
Now here's another big thing! The Literary Den Book of New Fiction 2009 is underway! We're putting the stories together as I type. Well, I mean people are writing them. If they're anywhere near as uncomfortable as I am right now, they might just be finishing them. This year, we're still supporting the Laura Crane Trust, but we have a few fresh faces! Brendan McLoughlan has joined our ranks from Howth, and Lisa Sills has returned to submit this year (she vanished just before it was announced last year, and arrived when the deadline passed). Jonathon Bell from Bermuda (living in Dublin) has submitted, and his wife, my good friend Liz, is due to submit too. It's a wonderful group of Irish writers joining the fray! I'm delighted with it.
The 08 Anthology is still on sale. I do hope you'll consider purchasing a copy. All the money goes to the charity. We're not greedy or anything. But we do like to bring it up a lot. For instance, today I had to tell a teacher in charge of my school's awards system about it for Charity and Public Service. If I win.... well I'll be well chuffed!! Purchase the book here: http://www.lulu.com/content/2619890
I may also be up for Best All-Round Student, but that's still in doubt. A teacher, the one in charge of the school magazine, said she'd nominate me for it. I've been a "one man army" in the computer room trying to get the 09 issue under wraps. Then I'm done with that establishment for good. That'll be weird! But I can't wait. Fingers crossed for the awards!
So, I think that's it for now. I've been extremely boring I bet, but I don't mind all that much. I've just needed to get all that out at once. Hopefully I'll be back. Whatever happens, always remember that the pen is mightier than the sword - violence is not the way forward. Books are!
I have been vanished for a good long while from this blog. I missed it a few minutes ago, and decided to give one massive update on it.... I've just checked my last post, and I discovered I used the term vanished then too.... righto!
Well, I completed NaNoWriMo. That was easy, and way back in November. I wrote a novel called Meet Sam, which I will get back to in a little while. I will tell you that it was super fun to write and came in at 50,074 words according to the NaNoWriMo drones. Following that, I was very lazy at writing, but managed to get Geneticide finished in January. Hurray for me! Since then, I've had Mocks (I did rather poorly in them), an oral Irish exam, and have had a huge number of writing related things happening. But let's do this properly - chronologically!
Meet Sam is a fantastic novel (for me) following a helplessly poor writer through one day of his otherwise dull life. He's single, and miserably so, and decides to invent a narrator for himself. Sam Richards is in fact a wee bit crazy. His narrator abuses him at every opportunity, but in the 24 hours that she exists, his life changes dramatically. The book is that story! As part of the deal for completing NaNoWriMo, I got to get a free proof copy of Meet Sam from a group of people called CreateSpace. They even covered the postage. That was nice of them. The book is a delightful addition to my collection, and has caught the attention of my mother's friends at work.
Geneticide finished with a much higher word count. I don't even know what it is, only that it's rather good. The story went exactly as planned, which I'm happy about. It took very long to write, but I think it'll do well if it ever goes anywhere.
In February, I turned 18. Normally, I don't celebrate my birthday with such excitedness, but this was the February midterm break too. This called for celebration. I threw a house party. It was a delightful gathering of my friends, during which there was a movie and a giant personality test. I'll expand on that now! The movie was in fact a home movie of sorts - Meet Sam, as done by my friends Karl, Andrew, Ciarán and Conor. They gave up a few afternoons to do it. Karl has since failed to upload it onto Youtube a dozen times, so I cannot share it with you. The personality test was the BBC one. It was rather fun, and had my friends bashing against each other in my kitchen. It was not built to hold 14 people in a tiny square.
Then came March, this month. I can tell you that things really changed this month. It's almost at an end too, so if there was nothing to report, there would be a problem. Now, I can't remember what happened first in all this, so I'll just ramble on about the various different things that have happened.
Let's start with dear old Patricia Scanlan! She did a book signing a couple of weeks ago to promote her new book Happily Ever After? at my shop. It was a great experience in itself to watch it and help out, btu then something really fun happened! She found out that I'm a writer, and told me to give her a call when my novel (Meet Sam) was editted, so that she could give it to her publishers! I was utterly gobsmacked!! Imagine me, a published author! With Transworld Ireland!!!
Then there's Battlefront. This is a Channel Four television show that encourages a whole set of campaigns from young people to help change the world. I submitted The Literary Den Campaign to them... and we're second in the voting stages. In a few days, voting stops and it goes to the "judges." If they pick my campaign, I may be on television!! That would be amazing!
The campaign is all about making reading and writing cool again. People seem to get bored with them ratehr easily these days. They abandon the thoughts of them for a TV show or a movie, or for mindless internet games. It's an awful shame, because they really are valuable skills for both work and life. Writing is a way of ridding oneself of the weird little ideas in their heads that can cause us troubles. I have not heard of any dangerous writers out there, so I must be right.
The campaign also sets out to start a mentoring system to help younger writers with their stuff. I'm one of the mentors, although we are without mentorees. I'm hoping to convince my good friend Sam to do it. He started writing a book way back in the summer and since stopped doing it. If I can spark his interest in writing again, and be his mentor to guide him along the way, then I'm doing something right. From there I'd like to see what the group can do. We may even be able to organise talks at schools! That would be sweet!
So, there's my campaign. Some of it, at least. If you wish to support us, you can vote at: http://battlefront.co.uk/campaign/the-literary-den-campaign Thanks a million in advance!!
Moving on now, I've subscribed to a magazine called The Stinging Fly. I've also submitted to them. By the end of the month, or in early April, I should hear from them to see how my submission of a short story and two poems went down. I imagine the story, called The Wounded Angel, stands a better chance than the poems, but who am I to judge? Fingers crossed anyway!
Now here's another big thing! The Literary Den Book of New Fiction 2009 is underway! We're putting the stories together as I type. Well, I mean people are writing them. If they're anywhere near as uncomfortable as I am right now, they might just be finishing them. This year, we're still supporting the Laura Crane Trust, but we have a few fresh faces! Brendan McLoughlan has joined our ranks from Howth, and Lisa Sills has returned to submit this year (she vanished just before it was announced last year, and arrived when the deadline passed). Jonathon Bell from Bermuda (living in Dublin) has submitted, and his wife, my good friend Liz, is due to submit too. It's a wonderful group of Irish writers joining the fray! I'm delighted with it.
The 08 Anthology is still on sale. I do hope you'll consider purchasing a copy. All the money goes to the charity. We're not greedy or anything. But we do like to bring it up a lot. For instance, today I had to tell a teacher in charge of my school's awards system about it for Charity and Public Service. If I win.... well I'll be well chuffed!! Purchase the book here: http://www.lulu.com/content/2619890
I may also be up for Best All-Round Student, but that's still in doubt. A teacher, the one in charge of the school magazine, said she'd nominate me for it. I've been a "one man army" in the computer room trying to get the 09 issue under wraps. Then I'm done with that establishment for good. That'll be weird! But I can't wait. Fingers crossed for the awards!
So, I think that's it for now. I've been extremely boring I bet, but I don't mind all that much. I've just needed to get all that out at once. Hopefully I'll be back. Whatever happens, always remember that the pen is mightier than the sword - violence is not the way forward. Books are!
Monday, October 27, 2008
NaNoWriMo
Hello All! I've been vanished for a while (incorrect grammar - so what?). However, I have been writing, which is good. And I've also entered a challenge to write a novel in November. NaNoWriMo is an annual event that takes place to encourage people to write a novel of 50,000 words in 30 days. That's an average of 1666.6666 (etc) words per day. Sound difficult? Yes, yes it does. But I can't wait!
I'm writing a story called Meet Sam for the month of November. Sam Emily Richards is a failing writer with an abusive imagination. Namely, the narrator is a product of his imaginatin. Her name is Emily - she's an upper class Englishwoman who teases and taunts Sam and the other characters, though only Sam is aware she is speaking. Emily and Sam can interact on occassion, though she ignores his questions and makes him out to be insane. She has no off switch, making Sam's experiment a little bit of a failure.
The novel will take place in one day of Sam's life, beginning early in the morning where we find Sam on Grafton Street in Dublin, moving to the LUAS, to Dundrum shopping centre, back home and to Temple Bar. The narrator will be driving him slowly crazier throughout the novel, while he attempts to finally make something of himself and turn everything around.
The opening extract of Meet Sam will be available to read on Saturday on my NaNoWriMo profile when the competiton starts. Give it some time, as I'm only allowed to start on Midnight on Friday/Saturday, but I'll be sleeping then so... yeah... you have to wait until I have something written and uploaded.
Wish me luck!!!
I'm writing a story called Meet Sam for the month of November. Sam Emily Richards is a failing writer with an abusive imagination. Namely, the narrator is a product of his imaginatin. Her name is Emily - she's an upper class Englishwoman who teases and taunts Sam and the other characters, though only Sam is aware she is speaking. Emily and Sam can interact on occassion, though she ignores his questions and makes him out to be insane. She has no off switch, making Sam's experiment a little bit of a failure.
The novel will take place in one day of Sam's life, beginning early in the morning where we find Sam on Grafton Street in Dublin, moving to the LUAS, to Dundrum shopping centre, back home and to Temple Bar. The narrator will be driving him slowly crazier throughout the novel, while he attempts to finally make something of himself and turn everything around.
The opening extract of Meet Sam will be available to read on Saturday on my NaNoWriMo profile when the competiton starts. Give it some time, as I'm only allowed to start on Midnight on Friday/Saturday, but I'll be sleeping then so... yeah... you have to wait until I have something written and uploaded.
Wish me luck!!!
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